


Counting Straw

by werebunny131



Category: Pokemon Mystery Dungeon, Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Time & Explorers of Darkness & Explorers of Sky
Genre: Aftermath of Darkrai, Gen, Nightmares, Sleep Deprivation, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Why Don't You Talk To Each Other?
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-11
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-04-24 18:49:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,145
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19179289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/werebunny131/pseuds/werebunny131
Summary: Even heroes have nightmares. Actually, heroes can have the worst nightmares of all. And this nightmare keeps coming back...





	1. Guilt

_'1,327…1,328…1,329…1,330…'_

The Bulbasaur sighed and stopped her tally. She was counting the straw that made up her bed. The straw. She was counting straw. Was that really how bad things had gotten? Was this going to be how she spent her nights now? Counting straw? What next? Stars? Breaths? The teeth of Sharpedo Bluff?

She would have to sleep eventually. Even if she stayed up every night for a week. Not only would it affect her exploration duties, but her partner would undoubtedly notice. Squirtle knew her very well. And she wasn't that good at hiding her thoughts from anyone.

Nor her fears.

But what could she do? Sleep? No. No, that wasn't going to happen. No matter how tired she might become. Sleep was not going to come to her. Not without a price. Not without a nightmare.

**The** nightmare…

_/"The world of darkness will be wonderful, Risika."/_

Risika shuddered. She had fought insane deities before. She had chased and defeated the cruelest outlaws and come out on top. She had seen a frozen future and stopped it from ever happening at all. She had been non-existent for a while, and had nearly _died_ numerous times. But she had never heard a sentence that scared her as much at that one had.

What was worse was that it was real. Well, it had felt real. A nightmare about a nightmare. Oh, the irony. Only after Darkrai was defeated did the worst nightmare come to her. She couldn't even blame this one on him. This nightmare was all her own mind's doing. Throwing in her face the one thing she couldn't fight off.

Maybe she should go back to counting straw.

She sighed again. Counting straw and staying awake wasn't going to solve the problem. It would only sap her strength and weaken her mind. She couldn't hide from her nightmares. They were messages from her mind. Things she had to face. But…

_/"The world of darkness will be wonderful, Risika."/_

She couldn't. She was scared. Scared of that ever happening. Scared of waking up and being back there, in the Dark Crater with her partner turning his back on everything they had ever fought for…She was scared of finding out that **that** was reality, and that **this** was the dream. If she didn't fall asleep, she couldn't wake up.

But it wasn't only that. She was scared…she was scared of talking about it with Squirtle. Squirtle was her partner. She should know him better than anyone, and maybe she did. But…she had…believed… Believed that he could have truly joined Darkrai. There had been disbelief, but there had still been that hopelessness inside of her that said _'He's gone. He's the enemy now. To save the world, you have to defeat your best friend. Or join him…'_

She shouldn't have thought that. She should have known. She should have known that it was all just a trick. But…she hadn't… And now, she was scared…Scared that if she brought it back up…he would remember that she had believed…and he would be disappointed…

She rolled onto her side. What was taking the sun so long? It should be morning by now. Her nights were taking on a pattern nowadays. She and Squirtle would go to bed together, and fall asleep. Then the nightmare would come. And she would wake up. And she would stay awake until morning came. She could handle that; the sleep she got was enough to get her through the day. But this time morning wasn't coming to bring a day full of exploring to save her. She was stuck. Waiting for the rest of the world to wake up. Alone.

Counting straw.

A few times she had gone out and visited Spinda's Café. Spinda, Wynaught, and Wobbafet were always there; along with some of the more regular customers. It had been nice. But it only took a few visits before they started asking if everything was alright. They knew she worked hard during the day. They saw the Pokémon who brought her team challenges, and job requests. So when they saw her awake far too late (or far too early) they worried. What was she supposed to say? Explain why she woke up every night? No. Best to just stay in bed.

And…count straw…

Fun.

No. Not fun at all. In all honesty, she was bored out of her mind. Boredom doesn't keep her awake. Boredom made her sleepy.

Sleep was not an option.

She had lost count of how many pieces of straw were on the left side of her bed. Or was it the right? Had she already counted that pile? Oh, where was the **sun?**

She closed her eyes. Enough. Being impatient won't bring the dawn any faster. Just relax. Listen to the sea. Count the waves. Breathe. Focus.

But don't fall asleep.

_'1…2…3…4…5…6…7…8…'_

__

__

_/"We can't possibly defeat him."/_

_/"He won't want just me. He'll get rid of me."/_

_/"The world of darkness will be wonderful, Risika."/_

Her eyes snapped open again. Hadn't she just told herself not to go to sleep? Oh, she knew if she so much as closed her eyes she would fall asleep. She was that tired. But she had had a fleeting hope that maybe, just maybe, this time, the nightmare wouldn't come.

Waste of hope. It came. Just like before. Just like it always did.

She wasn't normally this downhearted. But a few weeks with little to no sleep and constant nightmares had drained her good-humour. Hard to be cheerful when one of the worst moments of your life replayed in your head every night.

She was surprised that Squirtle hadn't noticed her change in behavior. Maybe he was just too excited about their daily jobs. Or maybe…Maybe he knew. And…what? Wasn't asking her about it because he thought she could handle it? Or because he wanted her to tell him herself? Or maybe he knew more than she thought.

Maybe he was disappointed…

Squirtle…

She hadn't meant to let him down. Well, no one means to do that. But, what could she do? She could have done a whole lot back then, but what was she supposed to do now?

_Face it._

Face the nightmare? Accept it? Accept that she had frozen, and had almost had to make a terrible choice? Or keep herself up every night to hide from it? To…count straw?

She knew which was the 'correct' decision, but…she couldn't. If he remembered her hesitation, her belief, he would hate her for it. He would leave her. She would lose the best friend she could ever remember having.

_Will you lose faith in him again, Risika?_

The more reasonable part of her, the part that told her to talk to Squirtle so she could put this mess behind her, sounded like Grovyle. For all that she could only remember knowing him for a few days; his common sense had stayed with her. He had made an impression on her, and on Squirtle. Grovyle had been a hero. But he was wrong this time.

She wasn't losing faith in Squirtle! She was losing faith in herself. She had made a horrible judgment on a situation, and had almost made a terrible decision. That was her fault.

_So you don't trust him to understand?_

It wasn't that. There was no understanding. She had lost faith in him. She had believed that he could've turned and joined Darkrai. How could she have done that? Even if it was just for an instant, she had been prepared to make a choice. To either join him, in order to save him, or to stop the world of darkness.

Even if it meant stopping Squirtle, too.

He would hate her for losing faith like that. He had to.

_Do you really think you're the only one with nightmares?_

The…only one?

Of course. Squirtle. He had probably had his share of nightmares about that awful mission. But he hadn't been faced with an illusion of her. He hadn't almost fought his partner because he couldn't tell the difference between the real and the fake. He knew her better than she knew him.

She was not worthy of being his friend…

_Do you think you're the only one with nightmares?_

No. She didn't. But she was the only one with nightmares she couldn't fight. The Bulbasaur shook her head to clear it. This night had been a waste of time. She felt more tired thinking about why she was tired! She had been better off counting straw. She may have lost count twice tonight, but she still had plenty of time to start over. It wasn't as though the sun was in any hurry to rise.

_'1…2…3…4…5…6…'_


	2. Fear

Squirtle listened carefully to the rustling of straw from his partner's bed. He hoped she was trying to get back to sleep, but with how tired she'd been looking lately, and how long it had been since either of them had had a full night's rest, he doubted it.

The sounds of shifting straw continued in a steady rhythm, so Squirtle focused his attention off of his hearing, and back to the problem at hand.

How long had he been waking up in the middle of the night? A few weeks? A month? Two? Waking up every night, not just because of his own nightmares, but because of the sounds his partner made as she too, fought free of her dreams. Honestly, he thought Risika may have it worse. She looked so tired. At least he got back to sleep every time he had a nightmare. It usually just came back, but at least it brought a few more minutes of sleep as it did. He didn't think Risika slept more than once a night. He shifted his head slightly to the left and saw that she had returned to her old standby. She was counting straw.

It looked sort of relaxing. He had thought about joining in a few times before, but he just…couldn't. If she knew he was awake, she would ask why. What was he supposed to say to that? Well, he could just tell her that he had noticed a lack of snoring. It was the truth, or at least part of it. He had never really noticed before; he had been so preoccupied with his nightmares, he hadn't bothered to turn over and check on her. It was only after Wynaut had mentioned Risika's late night/early morning visits to the café that Squirtle had paid closer attention to his partner's health. She looked exhausted. As the days went on, he realized that, although he saw her go to sleep, she would still look so tired the next day. It was that same night that he had noticed how quiet it was inside Sharpedo Bluff during the night.

Now, Risika didn't snore all the time, just most of the time; but even when she did, it wasn't very loud. Just enough to be noticeable, but quiet enough that it faded into the background if one didn't pay attention to it, melding together with the sound of the waves as they crashed onto the shore. Squirtle had always found it rather comforting. To noticed that the snores were gone, and to not know how long they hadn't been there, was disconcerting. He was her partner. He was supposed to notice stuff like that.

But even if he did talk to her about her nightly counting sprees, and even if he did make the excuse about the lack of snoring, it wasn't the truth. Not the whole truth anyway. He wasn't a good liar, and didn't really plan to be. Risika would know. She knew him. He felt his stomach churn. Risika knew him, and he claimed to know her just as well. But if he really knew her as well as he had thought he did, why hadn't he known about her sleeping problems? He should have. But he hadn't. And now, instead of talking about it, and apologizing, he just listened to the shifting of straw every night. Sometimes he would drift back to sleep, but then the nightmare would come and he would return to his listening. He felt small doing that. He felt like he had returned to the coward he'd once been. Too afraid of a voice in a grate to stand still, and too afraid of saying the wrong thing to even try talking to his friend about what was wrong. But…how was he supposed to tell her? How could he possibly explain to her what he dreamed of every night?

_/"The world of darkness will be wonderful, Risika."/_

Involuntarily, he shuddered. The straw paused in its shifting as his partner noticed the movement. Squirtle stayed very still. It started again, and he relaxed.

That phrase…everything that had happened to him, and the thing that filled him with the most dread was one, ordinary sentence. But he did have a very good reason for the fear.

In Dark Crater, He, Risika, and Cresselia had confronted the mastermind behind all of the world's troubles: Darkrai. But before the battle had started, Darkrai had offered them a place by his side. To rule in a world of darkness. This was where Squirtle's nightmare began. Because when it had happened, for a second, he had considered it. And for an even briefer moment, though the darkest in his life, he had wanted to say…

_'Yes.'_

Inside, Squirtle still had a tiny piece of the coward he'd once been. That small, cowardly part of him had been terrified in the Dark Crater. Utterly consumed by fear, that part would have done anything Darkrai wanted as long as it assured its survival. It disgusted him how pathetic that part of him was, but only as much as it frightened him. How could he have even thought of thinking about joining Darkrai? He knew he had been a coward, but he had never realized just how desperate he could be when he was scared. That the offer had even been considered filled Squirtle with shame, but also dread. Dread that something like that may happen again, and that he might consider another such offer.

But the nightmare didn't end there.

As the split-second of agreement had come and gone, Squirtle had seen something shift. Then, he saw himself, agree with Darkrai. Out loud! The reasons he stated were…good ones…but then he watched himself do something horrible.

He watched as he walked over to Darkrai and stood by his side, like a loyal servant.

Seeing himself by the side of evil was bad enough, and it was really bad, but as Squirtle turned to look as his teammates, he had noticed Risika's face, and her expression broke his heart.

Risika looked at the Squirtle next to Darkrai with an expression of devastation. She looked…lost. Lost, and abandoned and shocked and horrified, all at once. She looked as though her world had ended.

Squirtle hadn't even had time to try and help his partner before Darkrai started offering Risika the same promise of power and control over the coming world of darkness. That was bad. But then he heard himself, the Darkrai-Squirtle, support the offer, and he began to panic. He'd tried to move, to do something. To attack Darkrai. To attack himself. But he hadn't been able to move, he was shaking too badly.

Naturally, Risika wasn't agreeing to any offer the nightmare deity brought to the table, so Darkrai had tried something else. Something worse.

Darkrai had threatened him, Squirtle. He and Risika were a team. Darkrai wouldn't accept only one of the 'set'. Risika joined, or he would pay for it.

Risika's face had shattered. To her, it looked like her friend had betrayed her, and yet she still had to save him, but this time, by becoming a traitor herself. It had looked that way to Squirtle as well. He still found himself too shaken to move, and as he watched his friend slowly walk towards the deity of darkness, he couldn't see how moving would do him much good anyway. He had apparently joined Darkrai. Risika, in saving him, was going to join as well, and now they would fight and defeat Cresselia and bring about the world of darkness that they had fought so hard to prevent.

_/"The world of darkness will be wonderful, Risika."/_

He had shuddered then too. It was a creepy sentence now, but the first time it had been said…the first time he had said it, had been downright terrifying. But it had also been oddly helpful. When he'd heard the Darkrai-Squirtle say it, he had shuddered, but the Squirtle in front of him hadn't reacted with any kind of revulsion, or horror. He was just staring at Risika with a bland smile on his face.

Their reactions were different. He'd feared that the he was just having an out-of-body experience and that he truly was standing by the side of Darkrai. But now...now he knew. For sure.

That. Wasn't. Him.

Coward he may have been, but that wasn't him anymore. He had grown strong. For her. He had faced his fears. For **her.** He hadn't run away from saving the world then, and he wasn't going to run away from saving his partner now.

_/"Well, Risika?"/_

_/"I…"/_

The shaking stopped. The coward had fled. Time to save the world one more time.

_/"No! Risika! Don't be fooled!"/_

He remembered seeing Risika's face clear and watching her attack Darkrai. Then everything shattered, and the nightmare, the first nightmare, had ended.

But that was not his nightmare. That was what had truly happened. What he dreamed was much worse. In his dream, it wasn't a dream. He saw himself stand by the side of Darkrai, but then his perspective shifted, and he was by the side of the Dark Deity. The coward had consumed him, turning him against his best friend and the world. The dream had been reality, and the reality he thought he had escaped into, only another dream.

He saw himself attack Risika, and woke up.

Every night, the dream came. And every night, he woke up panicking.

And every night, he was ashamed. Because he just kept ignoring it. Kept going to bed hoping the nightmare would leave him alone this time. This was the night he'd get a proper rest. This was the night. Or the next one. Or the next.

Which was why he was lying awake now, listening to Risika count the straw of her bed and cursing himself for being a coward.

Again.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Fanfiction.Net


End file.
